Surfactants & Solubilizers

Surfactants, or SURFace ACTive ageNTS represent a very large category of ingredients ranging from emulsifiers to solubilizers to detergents and degreasers. At ITDF, our line includes the mildest high performing surfactants, which are natural and plant based. Surfactants are typically categorized by their ionic (an ion is simply an atom which has lost an electron to make it have a charge (positive or negative)) nature, i.e, Anionic (negative charge), Nonionic (no charge), Cationic (positive charge), or Amphoteric (a positive and a negative charge, cationic in acidic environment, anionic in alkaline environment). Anionic surfactants are most often used as cleansing agents in formulations, while Cationics are primarily utilized as conditioning agents because of their attraction to negatively charged skin and hair. Nonionics and Amphoterics are typically used as thickeners, foam boosters, and stabilizers in shampoo and body wash formulations. We offer single surfactants for your mixing and matching needs and surfactant blends for ease of formulation.

With all surfactant and blends you may wish to open the caps, occasionally, to allow any build-up pressure to escape otherwise as the air trapped in the product escapes into the container there is nowhere for it to go and this may result in increased pressure in the empty space of the container which will rush out as the container is opened, due to the increased pressure from storage.  This is expected and does not impact performance.

With powder surfactants it will make your processing / compounding easier and result in a more efficiently blended final product if you incorporate those powders into your other liquid surfactants and oils.  This will be true even though they may be water soluble.